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hawkwing_lbTo Aphrodite
And so then they mounted on the well-wrought couches,
And first he tore away the brilliant ornaments from her skin,
Curved brooches and arm-rings and flower-cup earrings and chains,
And he unfastened her girdle and stripped off her splendid garment
And Anchises lay down upon the silver-ornamented bench:
And he, though a mortal, by the will of the gods and
By immortal decree, lay with a goddess all unknowing.
And in the hour when herdsmen drive their cattle
Back to the place of rest, and fat sheep from pasturages adorned with flowers:
[Aphrodite] let sweet-tasting balmy sleep fall on Anchises,
And she clothed her skin in fine garments,
And when she’d clothed herself all well close about her skin in a state suited to goddesses,
She stood beside the bed, and her head reached to the
well-wrought roof: and divine beauty shone from her cheeks,
of the kind that is [the beauty] of well-crowned Kythereia,
and forth from sleep she roused him, and she spoke speech and from it she named him:
“Arise, descendent of Dardanos! Why now do you pass the night in sleep without waking?
Consider if I seem to be of the same station as that person
which you first saw with your eyes?”
So she spoke: and he from sleep heard instantly.
And so he beheld the neck and the fair eyes of Aphrodite,
And he dreaded her warning and turning aside he looked in another place.
And he covered his fair face again with his cloak,
And entreating her he spoke winged words:
“As soon as I first saw you, goddess, with my eyes,
I understood you were like a god: though you did not speak real truths.
But I beg you by aegis-bearing Zeus,
Don’t let me abide among men who live fleeting [lives]
But pity me: he’s not a strong man afterwards,
The man who lies with deathless goddesses.”
And so then they mounted on the well-wrought couches,
And first he tore away the brilliant ornaments from her skin,
Curved brooches and arm-rings and flower-cup earrings and chains,
And he unfastened her girdle and stripped off her splendid garment
And Anchises lay down upon the silver-ornamented bench:
And he, though a mortal, by the will of the gods and
By immortal decree, lay with a goddess all unknowing.
And in the hour when herdsmen drive their cattle
Back to the place of rest, and fat sheep from pasturages adorned with flowers:
[Aphrodite] let sweet-tasting balmy sleep fall on Anchises,
And she clothed her skin in fine garments,
And when she’d clothed herself all well close about her skin in a state suited to goddesses,
She stood beside the bed, and her head reached to the
well-wrought roof: and divine beauty shone from her cheeks,
of the kind that is [the beauty] of well-crowned Kythereia,
and forth from sleep she roused him, and she spoke speech and from it she named him:
“Arise, descendent of Dardanos! Why now do you pass the night in sleep without waking?
Consider if I seem to be of the same station as that person
which you first saw with your eyes?”
So she spoke: and he from sleep heard instantly.
And so he beheld the neck and the fair eyes of Aphrodite,
And he dreaded her warning and turning aside he looked in another place.
And he covered his fair face again with his cloak,
And entreating her he spoke winged words:
“As soon as I first saw you, goddess, with my eyes,
I understood you were like a god: though you did not speak real truths.
But I beg you by aegis-bearing Zeus,
Don’t let me abide among men who live fleeting [lives]
But pity me: he’s not a strong man afterwards,
The man who lies with deathless goddesses.”
